The present invention is directed to high speed centrifuge rotors and, more particularly, is directed to a liner for use in a swinging bucket type of centrifuge rotor for support of flexible bag containers holding fluid samples.
When blood is collected from a donor, it is normally received in a flexible bag type of container. This container is suitable for not only the collection of the blood, but also for the storage and maintenance of the blood prior to its subsequent use in helping a needy recipient. In many instances, diagnostic work done with blood requires the subjection of the blood to a centrifuge force field. Since it is a requirement that the blood not be transferred or in any way removed from the container in which it was collected for reasons of possible contamination, a centrifuge rotor with swinging buckets is typically used so that the flexible blood bag can be inserted into the bucket cavity. In some centrifuge rotor buckets, the size of the cavity is such that it will accept two or more blood bags. This is economically important because, if a particular centrifuge rotor has six buckets in which to place a blood bag and if the two blood bags can be inserted into each bucket, the capacity of the rotor is doubled and will result in the centrifugation of twice the number of samples for each centrifugation run.
However, it has been found that placing blood bags side by side in the rotor bucket cavity may result in the bags slipping or becoming improperly oriented within the bucket during centrifugation. Also, it has been found that it is sometimes difficult to insert the bags into the rotor bucket. This is exemplified by the considerable weight of the bucket which must be removed from the rotor yoke and placed on a table in order to conveniently insert the blood bags. In some instances, since the blood bags are typically made of a plastic type material, they are difficult to grasp and remove subsequent to the centrifugation run.
Also, these flexible thin plastic bags require that the interior of the swinging bucket be extremely smooth when it is made so that there is no chance of possible damage to the bags which would cause a leakage. Consequently, there is more machining cost involved making sure that the interior of the forged swinging bucket is as smooth as required. In some instances, the bag may be damaged when during centrifugation the bag is forced against a sharp interior bottom/wall junction or corner where the bag material is stretched too far, causing a tear in the bag.
In some instances there may be a defect in the blood bag which may result in leakage during the operation of the centrifuge. Consequently, it is necessary subsequent to the centrifugation run to clean the interior of the bucket. Since the buckets are relatively heavy and cause some difficulty in properly cleaning them, an unwarranted amount of time can be spent doing this necessary cleaning operation.